Wife, nephew strangle man after he objects to their affair

Bangalore, Nov 8: It was a well-hatched plan. To pass off a murder as a natural death. However, it went awry, thanks to a neighbouris intervention. A woman who tried to strangle her husband to death with her lover's help landed in police net on Wednesday. The victim, D Dayanandaswamy, 55, died in hospital.

The accused Ratnamma Dayanandaswamy, 33, and lover Chennabasava, 27, who is her husband's nephew, have been sent to judicial custody, police said. The duo allegedly strangled Dayanandaswamy at his Jalahalli residence late on Tuesday night and assumed he wasdead.However,hewasonly unconscious, police said.

A father of two schoolgoing children, Dayanandaswamy owned an Iyengar Bakery near Jalahalli Cross. "Hailing from Arasikere, he came to Bangalore 35 years ago and worked in several hotels as a cook. In 2001, he opened the bakery and appointed Chennabasava, the younger son of his elder sister, a school dropout, as his assistant," a neighbour said.

Chennabasava soon developed a relationship with Ratnamma. Dayanandaswamy got to know of it when he caught the duo in a compromising position. Enraged, he asked Chennabasava to leave. He moved out and started working at another bakery.

"In the last week of September, Dayanandaswamy warned Ratnamma that he would divorce her if she didn't end the affair. On Tuesday afternoon, however, he again caught Ratnamma with Chennabasava and entered into a heated argument with them. The same night, the duo strangled Dayanandaswamy and he fell unconscious," police sources said.

TWIST IN THE TALE

Assuming that Dayanadaswamy was dead, Ratnamma and Chennabasava began to prepare for his last rites. They told neighbours that he had died of dehydration and arranged for a tempo to shift the body to Arasikere. However, one of the neighbours was taken aback when he noticed the 'dead' Dayanandaswamy breathing, albeit at irregular intervals. "Immediately, we alerted police who rushed Dayanandaswamy to hospital," said neighbours.